When he said edge, Van of course meant the edge of the island. In Firmament, that was how the plateaus that formed the upper part of the world pillars were called.

The islands themselves were of various sizes and always circular in shape, but sometimes natural rock formations or mountains would jut out beyond the edge, or plants would grow over them. The edge fascinated Salome for one simple reason: no matter where she went, sooner or later she would reach the end of the world, but at the same time that only meant that somewhere else a new world was beginning.

"Van, say, what exactly is that?" Salome asked, pointing at the bright disc that hung weightlessly over the horizon. Van blinked and turned around, his gaze following her gesture. "What do you mean? What’s over there?"

"Well, this incredibly bright thing in the sky! The burning disc! Come on, it's impossible to miss."

"Wha—wait, do you mean the sun?" Van looked at her in disbelief.

"The sun..." Salome repeated the name reverently as she gazed at the golden disc. She had to squint her eyes into slits, yet even then she couldn’t look directly at its brightness.

"You really had no idea, did you?" Van said. There was a hint of surprise in his eyes, which gradually turned into pity.

"And the sky... why is it blue? How can that be?" Salome asked, tilting her head back.

"Why?" Van frowned. "What kind of question is that? The sky has always been like that. What makes you think there’s a reason behind it?"

Salome hesitated. "All my life, the sky was just a mass of gray clouds, you know? Until today, I had no idea that there was another, real sky behind them. To me... the clouds were the sky."

Van walked silently through the tall grass, seemingly pondering her words. "So you mean, no one ever even considered that something might exist above the clouds?" he asked.

"Just the thought is—was—absurd," said Salome. "Besides, we knew exactly what was above our heads," she added sarcastically.

"Right, you did mention something like that once," Van mused. "There’s only clouds over Fundament and the pillars are infinite and all that nonsense. Who told you this junk?"

"That’s just what we are told," Salome explained with a shrug. "The world is in a state of constant decay and Fundament is all that remains of it today. The clouds are the remnants of what has dissolved into mist, filling the vast emptiness that surrounds us. Only the world pillars remain untouched by decay. They are the framework of the world, with no beginning and no end."

"A nice story," said Van.

"And it’s obviously made up," grumbled Salome. "I can’t believe I just accepted all of this!"

Van grinned. "You know what? I think I should tell you a few little things about my beloved homeland, now that you have no choice but to believe me."

He began to describe impossible and wondrous things that, until recently, Salome would have never believed. Among other things, he mentioned that in Firmament, people traveled between the islands by ship. Ships that glided through the air as if on water! She was eager to see one. Salome knew—aside from the boats that rattled up and down the river in her homeland—real ships only from pictures she had seen in books. They sailed the seas around Fundament near the coast and were used to transport large quantities of goods. Could something so heavy actually fly through the air like a bird? Or did they end up looking completely different and were just called ships? She immediately scanned the horizon for them, but she couldn’t find anything that fit her idea of a ship.

As they walked along the edge, Salome gradually became aware of just how large the island was. She couldn’t see the other side, as the ground flowed in gentle waves into low hills that blocked her view. When they climbed one of these gentle ridges, she noticed strange silhouettes emerging in the distance from the haze left behind by the drifting cloud strip. They were the outlines of buildings, or rather, ruins that jutted out of the ground at considerable distances from each other. They looked like the remnants of simple dwellings. A soft whistling sounded as the wind brushed past their old, moss-covered walls and swept through the empty windows and doors.

When Salome asked Van about them, he said "It’s possible that people once lived here long ago, but these ruins could stand here for another reason as well. In Firmament, countless things are not at all what they seem at first glance." Then he added, "But it would be pretty... dumb to build a settlement on an island like this."

"Why is that?" Salome asked, intrigued.

"Because of the storms!" Van exclaimed, as if that were something every child knew. "We’re at least in the fourth sphere here, if not the fifth. Even a small storm could wreak serious havoc on such a flat island!"

He probably gathered from Salome’s utterly confused look that she had no idea what he was talking about. He sighed.

"You do know what a storm is, don’t you?"

Salome shook her head hesitantly. She vaguely remembered having heard the word from Van before, but she couldn’t make sense of it.

Van gave her a resigned look. He stopped and ran his hand through the tall grass swaying around his knees.

"What do you think happens when the wind grows stronger than a simple breeze drifting through the sky? When it swells up, starts to roar and bellow, when it herds all the clouds in the air like a flock of sheep until their sheer mass darkens the sun?" He looked up at the thin, white cloud strips drifting peacefully high above him. "The wind has been sweeping through the sky of this world since the beginning of time. It is boundless, an unbridled, primordial force that no one can ever restrain. One should never underestimate it."

This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

Salome stretched out her hand and felt the invisible caress that played over her fingers. Could it really become stronger? It was hard for her to imagine.

"Next, lightning flashes across the sky, accompanied by loud thunder," Van continued.

"Oh, I know those!" Salome interrupted. "Sometimes the clouds light up brightly, and then there’s a tremendous roar. Is it similar here in Firmament?"

"Well... more or less," said Van. He cleared his throat. "The weather here is a decisive factor. That’s why Firmament is divided into spheres from bottom to top. The cloud ocean occupies the first sphere, while the highest islands are in the thirteenth sphere." He pointed straight up into the sky with his finger. "They say there are islands even higher than that, but I haven’t seen anything like that so far. In any case, this division into spheres is important because the behavior of the wind changes with altitude. Basically, the higher you go, the stronger the wind can become. But that only applies up to the ninth sphere. Beyond that, for some reason, it grows weaker again. Far up, there is at most a weak breeze, and otherwise it’s simply terribly cold."

Salome wondered how far an island in the thirteenth sphere was from the cloud ocean, or even from Fundament itself. Could one see it from here? And what might the view be like from up there? One must be able to see the entire world.

"We’re at least in the fourth sphere here, which means a storm can already become quite unpleasant," Van explained. "Now, just imagine a storm on this island, where there are no natural elevations, no forests, and no mountains." A grin flashed across his face. "At first, it would just rain heavily. But before you know it, a thick cloud would hang before the sun, and then the wind would blow stronger and stronger until it seems to rain from every direction."

Salome noticed a faint gleam in Van’s eyes as he looked at the thin cloud fragments drifting close to the ground. "Next, things that aren’t firmly anchored to the earth start to lift off, and then you can only wave them goodbye. What the wind takes away, it won’t give back. But that’s not all! It will become so strong that even people will be blown away as if they were as light as feathers. When it comes to that point, you’d best not be wandering around outside. Unless you want to race the birds." Van looked at Salome with a mischievous smile. "That’s why I think it’s stupid to build a settlement here. A storm would sweep across the land unimpeded, carrying everything away, including us, and transport it for miles until it drops us somewhere over the cloud ocean. It’s probably also the reason why only ruins remain here."

A shiver ran down Salome’s spine as she imagined falling freely, unimpeded, onto the white mass far below, yet at the same time she felt a spark of curiosity.

"When do you think the next storm will come?" she asked softly.

"Not today," Van replied after a brief pause. "Why? Don’t tell me I scared you?"

"No... honestly, I would very much like to experience such a storm for myself," Salome admitted shyly.

"What? Weren’t you listening?" Van asked, puzzled. "A real storm is no pleasant thing and can be damn dangerous!"

"Maybe so... but that doesn’t change the fact that I want to see it," Salome said a bit bashfully.

Van regarded her for a moment in disbelief, then burst into amused laughter. "Seems like Firmament’s air does you good. Come on, let’s move on."

They continued along the plain, always close to the abyss on their right, with Van leading and Salome following closely behind. The trail of trampled blades of grass they left in the tall field was like a fleeting memory of their visit. Salome enjoyed every step in this new world, and it was nearly impossible to get enough of all the wonders it had to offer. Under the glow of the sun, it seemed as if the world pulsed with life. The wonderfully warm light bestowed a magnificent luster on all colors, breathing life into them and perfecting them. Never before had Salome felt so deeply for such simple things, even though for the moment they were still new and unfamiliar to her.

"There it is," Van said suddenly. He pointed to one of the ruins a short distance from the edge. It was larger than the others and seemed to have retained much of its original shape. Old masonry in the form of a round tower stood above a wide gateway, crowned by decrepit wooden beams that must have once supported a pointed roof. At the very top of the wall, a strange framework of crossed, rusty iron bars jutted into the air, swaying back and forth in the constant breeze.

"This mill is still in reasonably good condition, and the walls aren’t too riddled with holes," Van explained after they reached the ruin. "We’ll spend the night here. Gonna protect us from the damp and the weather."

A mill, then. Salome regarded the peculiar building and wondered why it had been built right here, even though there was no river in sight to drive a mill wheel. And what was with those iron bars? She glanced inside and saw a somewhat sturdy stone staircase that spiraled up along the inner walls all the way to the roof. Tentatively, she stepped onto the lowest step and found that the thick stone blocks supported her weight without any trouble. As she watched the deep golden rays of light, which fell like a velvety curtain through a hole at the very top of the ceiling, a thought suddenly occurred to her.

"Van, what actually happens to the sun when night comes?"

Van opened his mouth, thought for a moment, and then replied with a smile, "Just wait and see."

Curious, Salome decided to climb the staircase and take a look at the sky. She had already noticed that the glaring disc called the sun seemed to be slowly moving across the sky, but until now she had dismissed it as a mere illusion. But what if it really was moving? Could it actually disappear? Or would it simply fade out like a candle flame? When she reached the last few steps, she entered what must have once been a kind of roof chamber, though over time the roof had been lost. Now the tower offered a magnificent view over Firmament, and her suspicion was confirmed: the sun hung low in the west above the horizon, its dazzling light already beginning to lose some of its intensity.

Salome rested her arms on the waist-high remnants of the tower wall before her and absorbed the vivid, shifting spectacle. Who would have thought the sky could be so changeable?

The sun inched ever closer to the horizon and finally immersed itself into the cloud ocean, as if settling down into the white waves. When it was finally completely swallowed by the clouds and its last flames extinguished, Salome felt a painful tinge in her chest, an unexpected sadness, like she lost something important. But then she noticed a strange shimmer that had spread over the world. She lifted her head and her eyes grew wide.

Thousands and countless thousands of tiny lights had appeared out of nowhere. They speckled the sky like myriad frozen sparks, like glistening, living raindrops pulsing in silver waves. Delicate ribbons in ethereal shades of green and purple traced sinuous paths through the sparkling void, and amid this sea of gleaming darkness hung a graceful white crescent.

"Do you like it?" Van asked.

Salome started. She hadn’t even noticed that Van had climbed up to join her. Completely astonished, she first looked at him, then at the sky, and finally back at him. Her mouth opened and closed silently, without uttering a single word. Van nodded, as if he had expected that reaction. Calmly, he strolled over to her and leaned against the wall beside her. "We call them stars," he said, tilting his head back. "No one really knows what they are. Some believe they are the suns of other worlds. A beautiful thought, isn’t it?" He gestured with his hand toward the slender crescent. "And that is the moon."

Slowly, Salome turned in place, letting her gaze wander in a circle. In silence, her lips formed the words, the names that Van had revealed to her. "How could I have lived so long without this sky..." she whispered.